| Hello everyone! Glad you all could join me on my second post. When I made the What Would You Like to Learn post, I got many requests to talk about Color Grading, fight scenes, and VFX. So I decided the best way was to make a short film (emphasis on short) that would cover all of these subjects. My plan is to take you guys through the whole production of this new short, and teach you along the way. So what am I teaching you now? Well, pre-production of course. Now I know a lot of you already know what a storyboard is and how to you use it. You guys can go ahead and download the free template and X my window out (I won't be mad if you just download and leave)! Those of you who want to learn more, read on! |  Click to download template |
What is a Storyboard?
Storyboarding is not a hard concept to grasp, so I won't pretend I'm a genius for knowing it. There are 3 stages when making a movie: Pre-production, production, and post-production. I'm currently in pre-production-- the planning stage.
A storyboard is a set of images used to pre-visualize a scene in a film. Storyboard templates come in all shapes and sizes, but they all pretty much do the same thing: Help you plan what you'll be shooting. Think of a storyboard as a comic book, where you will be drawing every shot of your film. You don't have to be a great artist; I find that stick figures are still better than nothing.
A storyboard is a set of images used to pre-visualize a scene in a film. Storyboard templates come in all shapes and sizes, but they all pretty much do the same thing: Help you plan what you'll be shooting. Think of a storyboard as a comic book, where you will be drawing every shot of your film. You don't have to be a great artist; I find that stick figures are still better than nothing.
| Doing a storyboard is a must for most projects. Once upon a time I didn't do storyboards. I just assumed that I would always remember what I was supposed to do, after all, I was always the director, cameraman, and editor... right? Well, that didn't always work out so great. |  Hollywood professionals love using children to draw their storyboards since they're so creative. |
Why make a storyboard?
- It will save you time on the set. A big part of indie filmmaking is unpaid crew and actors. They last thing you want to do is waste their time. Doing a storyboard will...
- ... help you know what to shoot, when, and how to shoot it. After visualizing your next blockbuster (yea right!) you should put it down on paper. Doing so means that you won't forget what you had planned, and you'll have less to worry about on set.
- You'll look like you know what you're doing. Nothing freaks crews or clients more than a director who seems to be making it up as he goes.
Bottom line:
Next time you have a shoot, visit the location beforehand, draw down your vision, and you'll see how much more productive the shoot will be. Instead of worrying about which shots to take while on set, you can focus more on directing your actors and your crew (if you're the director) or focus more in following the storyboard (if you're the DP).
Of course, things don't always go according to plan in real life, and you might have to change your vision if something goes differently on set (If you have to change location at the last minute, or if the actions change). In situations like this it's good to be flexible in order to adapt to the new changes. Unfortunately, flexibility comes with experience so I can't teach that to you, but you will usually find the storyboard still helpful in those situations.
Thank you for reading this tutorial! Hope you learned something new and find great uses for the template. For questions and comments, please comment below (I'll read all of them). Also, please share this around (links below) so the knowledge can spread!
PS: Hollywood professionals don't really use children to draw their storyboards.
-Rodolphe
Of course, things don't always go according to plan in real life, and you might have to change your vision if something goes differently on set (If you have to change location at the last minute, or if the actions change). In situations like this it's good to be flexible in order to adapt to the new changes. Unfortunately, flexibility comes with experience so I can't teach that to you, but you will usually find the storyboard still helpful in those situations.
Thank you for reading this tutorial! Hope you learned something new and find great uses for the template. For questions and comments, please comment below (I'll read all of them). Also, please share this around (links below) so the knowledge can spread!
PS: Hollywood professionals don't really use children to draw their storyboards.
-Rodolphe
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